


The Avengers and Food

by mybrotherharry



Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Incredible Hulk - All Media Types
Genre: Avengers friendship - Freeform, Bonding, Cooking, Food, Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Pining, Pre- Steve/Tony, Team Spirit, steve bucky friendship, stucky friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-26
Updated: 2015-11-26
Packaged: 2018-05-03 11:38:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,965
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5289272
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mybrotherharry/pseuds/mybrotherharry
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Avengers have rituals.  A lot of them are about food.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Avengers and Food

**Author's Note:**

  * For [scifigrl47](https://archiveofourown.org/users/scifigrl47/gifts), [copperbadge](https://archiveofourown.org/users/copperbadge/gifts).



> So I wrote a thing. 
> 
> It was going to be only Avengers friendship and bonding. 
> 
> For the most part, it is. But I couldn't help get some couples together at the end.
> 
> Sorry not sorry.

The Avengers have rituals.

These are often unspoken ones; established methods of operation that the team is aware of and accommodates around. After a long, classified mission in foreign lands, Natasha usually wants to spar her jet lag away. When the mission is particularly bad, Coulson is expected to take one for the team and spar with her, because, out of one super soldier, one deadly archer, a trained assassin, an alien demi-God, a green rage monster and an engineer in a super suit, Coulson is the most badass to be able to keep up with her.

Tony had been more than a little miffed about Agent’s super ninja skills.

The point is that each Avenger has their own ritual. Natasha spars her stress away. Steve runs half marathons across the city. Bucky paces till he has worn a hole in the floor. Clint shoots at a lot of Tony’s vases. Bruce locks himself away for hours in the lab. Thor goes to hole up in the comfort of Jane’s apartment. Tony causes explosions in the workshop. Coulson does paperwork. They have their own (unhealthy, some would say) coping mechanisms.

The food rituals emerge only when things are really bad.

The Avengers eat a lot. Steve can put away enough on a good day, and a tremendous amount on a bad one. Thor is perennially hungry, and Natasha can eat both of them under the table. Tony has learned not to be fooled by her size. Clint is a squirrel, sneaking bits and pieces of food and storing them away in crevices and nooks all over the tower. Tony pretends not to know about all of Clint’s hiding spots. Even he knows better than to knock over the can of worms labeled childhood food issues. Bruce is notoriously shy about food, constantly thinking of himself as an imposition. Bucky is the exact opposite, unashamedly stealing from everyone’s plates (except Natasha’s; the man is brave, not an idiot.)

Tony doesn’t care about things like grocery bills or food related expenses, but the first time his accountant processed annual numbers for the tower after the Avengers had moved in, he’d thought there was a mix-up of some sort: surely, this amount cannot be what the Avengers go through in food each year, can it?

Tony had laughed at the man’s naiveté and invited him to their next team dinner.

Watching Captain America and the God of Thunder race to finish their corn on the cob has a way of changing an accountant’s perspective.

*

**_Bruce_ **

The day Reed Richards accidentally lets loose a hallucinogenic toxin in the Avengers tower, is the day the Hulk rampages through Manhattan, taking away large chunks of buildings with him.

Between Iron Man, The Winter Soldier and Thor, they ensure zero casualties; but even they can’t keep anybody from getting injured. Seven law enforcement officers and five civilians land in the hospital in critical condition.

Bruce hides away in his suite at the tower and does not emerge for over seventy two hours.

Cap makes a blanket rule to give him twenty four more hours to sulk in private before pulling him out for an intervention. He also stops Clint and Tony from TPing Richards’ lab, but that is a whole another rant.

Nat finds Bruce in the common kitchen eighty hours after the Manhattan rampage, as the media has taken to calling it.

It is the middle of the night, and for once, even Tony is in bed, worn out after three days of helping in the clean up efforts of the city, moving rebar and clearing up building debris. (Cap had made them all go.)

The kitchen counter is covered with small cups of spices, and the floor has a layer of flour. A pot of something warm and flavorful is simmering on one of the stoves, and Bruce is chopping carrots with great precision at the opposite end of the counter.

“Bruce? You okay?” she asks gently, not wanting to startle him out of his reverie.

He does jump, but after seeing her, she watches him fight to get his breathing under control again.

“For heaven’s sake, Tasha,” he mutters. “Don’t do that ever, especially not when I am holding a knife in my hand.”

She raises an eyebrow at him, a gesture of _really? You are telling ME?_ He shrugs, a lazy smile playing on his lips.

“What are you making?” she asks, dipping a finger in the pot of simmering sauce and putting it to her mouth. The spice assaults her tongue, and she reaches for a glass from the cabinet and fills it with tap water.

“That’s really not hygienic, there’s a spoon like – right there,” he tells her over his shoulder, resuming his chopping. “Garlic naan bread, Indian vegetarian curry, rasamalai dessert and mutton biriyani.”

She gulps down water, and reaches for another cutting board and knives, starting in on chopping the green peppers he has laid out on the counter.

“That’s a lot of food,” she remarks. “All of them, complex and sophisticated dishes.”

“I needed a distraction,” he answers, not looking up from his board.

“You cook a lot in India?”

She waits to see if he will ask her to back off, but the silence surrounding them is comfortable and his breathing is normal. He is merely processing her question in his mind, not struggling with an unwillingness to answer.

“I didn’t have much of a choice,” he says finally. “I lived in some very – er, unfortunate areas. There weren’t exactly take-out places nearby. Besides, I was broke. Very, very broke. I made do with local produce and helpful neighbors.”

“Not bad at all for a man on the run,” she tells him, sampling another spoon of the sauce. This time, since she is prepared for the heat, it tastes much better on her tongue and she feels the multitude of flavors incorporated into the curry.

He turns around to inspect the electric cooker plugged in next to the sink, stirring the still cooking rice in there.

“I try,” he grimaces. She hops on to the counter and resumes chopping the bell peppers. “I used to do this all the time in India. I met some meditation gurus, who taught me to get used to repetitive tasks. They helped calm me down. Some people do yoga, others sew or knit, but cooking came naturally to me. It makes me feel comfortable, I guess.”

She has never heard him talk about his travels or experiences before, and a part of her is glad that he is choosing to unload on her rather than someone else on the team. They have always been the quietest ones of the Avengers, comfortable and in sync with each other better than anyone else. She nods to let him know that she is listening and watches him raid the fridge for more vegetables.

“Does this make you happy?”

He looks thrown by the question, as though happiness is a foreign concept. Perhaps it is, she realizes life must be incredibly lonely for him. She doesn’t want to pity him, but she is unable to help it. Bruce Banner is a very good man, she knows it for a fact, and she wishes a better life for him.

“It makes it easier, I guess,” he answers after a long pause. “Some days are just too – "

He breaks off, and she realizes there is no good ending to that sentence anyway.

He lays out some Indian red peppers for her next to her knives and she looks at him incredulously. He shrugs at her, completely unashamed about _adding more spice to this meal._

She sighs and starts peeling them to shed their seeds into a cup.

They work in silence for a while, getting lost in the rhythmic clanking of the knives, the sizzling of the sauce and the beeping of the rice cooker. He starts kneading dough for the naan and bakes it on a wrought iron pan. The aroma filling the kitchen is warm and comforting.

“You didn’t have to stay up and help,” he tells her, as they pour the curry into a large serving tray.

“Helping allows me to not feel entirely guilty when I hoard third servings of everything,” she tells him, smiling. “You are a really good chef, Bruce.”

He flushes and ducks his head, unable to meet her eyes, but she sees the edges of his lips curling.

“Do you think we should pack this away in the fridge?”

“Are you kidding?” she asks him. “This smells amazing. I give it five minutes before Cap or Thor or Clint make their way down here and start stuffing – "

“Oh my God, is that curry I smell?” Clint asks, leaning against the doorway. Coulson is a step behind him, fingers fastening his robe at the hip. Bruce averts his eyes away from the very prominent purple hickey on the agent’s neck.

“Sharks,” Nat says, slapping Clint’s finger away from the tray. “What did I tell you, Bruce? We live with a bunch of mannerless sharks.”

Bruce thrusts a spoon in Clint’s hand and starts loading up plates for the couple.

“Midnight feasts, yay!” Tony calls, entering the kitchen with Pepper. “I always wanted to pretend to be in a British boarding school like in all those old novels! Do we get to also have a pillow fight?”

“I want to know which novels you have been reading, Stark,” Coulson deadpans from his place on a stool at the counter, fighting with Clint’s fork for access to the rice on his plate.

“Brucie pie! You made naan bread! You are my favorite.”

“Don’t let Steve hear you say that,” Pepper snorts. “Let’s not make Bruce’s cooking the reason for Captain America bursting into tears.”

Tony flushes a deep scarlet and snatches away Pepper’s plate to hold it up high and out of reach because he really is twelve years old. Bruce hides a smile behind a hand, because Steve and Tony’s mutual admiration society is the funniest and most tragic thing to happen to their ragtag team. Natasha watches him smiling and gives him a meaningful look.

Steve, Bucky and Thor join them ten minutes later and that causes further chaos. Clint attempts to take away the biriyani in an effort to keep Steve and Thor from inhaling the whole pot. Coulson takes over minding the skillet and turning the naan breads to keep them from burning. Tony pulls ice tea and water bottles from the fridge, as everyone inevitably scrambles to soothe the burning with every mouthful.

In the midst of this chaos, at two in the morning, Bruce looks at Natasha and basks in the solidarity and love he feels in this room. Maybe, tomorrow, he will talk to Natasha about things. For now, he is content to watch the red tint in her hair under the bright kitchen lights.

*

**_Steve_ **

After the Triskelion, after waking up by the river, after chasing cold leads for months, Steve finds the Winter Soldier and brings him home to the tower.

That is the easy part.

Finding Bucky Barnes underneath layers and layers of psychological conditioning, on the other hand? Not so much.

Every day, Steve wants to find a new way to torture and kill every last Hydra operative. He worries about how disinclined the rest of the team is in stopping him.

He worries about Bucky. He worries about the nightmares, the screaming, the blank, soulless look in those familiar eyes. He doesn’t know what to do, what to say, or how to help. Coulson, god bless his soul, finds a trusted SHIELD psychiatrist and pulls the team together. Steve doesn’t know how he will ever thank Coulson for keeping a cool head when he entirely falls apart.

Sick and tired of waiting on his thumbs for Bucky to come back from his therapy appointment (Tony drives him; they’d all decided Steve was not helping things with his fidgeting and hovering), Steve goes to the kitchen to make mac and cheese.

As kids growing up in the depression era, mac and cheese had been a rare treat. They could never afford a lot of nice cheeses, but for special occasions like birthdays, he and Bucky would pool their nickels together and scrape together a meal. Macaroni was always filling, so they would usually be able to skip the following meal because of it.

Pepper always keeps a variety of cheeses in the refrigerator. He has seen her nibble endlessly on crackers with a side of cheese, and he does not understand how that sustains her. Women in this century were endlessly fascinating to him, be it women like Natasha who would eat seven cheeseburgers in a row without blinking an eye or women like Pepper who would go entire days on just slimy green smoothies, salads or crackers.

He pulls out cheddar and parmesan to start grating, after setting the pasta on the stove. The silent, repetitive motion of his hands and the gentle pressure on the grater keep him occupied for a while, letting his mind wander.

“Penny for em?” asks Clint, perched on one of the stools. Steve jumps a mile in the air, his heart racing.

“Okay,” he mutters. “You and Nat have got to stop doing that.”

“You know what they say, old habits.” Clint grins. “Oooh Cap, are you making mac and cheese?”

“Yeah,” he replies. “It used to be Buck’s favorite.”

“Can I help? And if I do, can I get first taste?”

“Sure,” Steve shrugs. “I need bread crumbs for the topping.”

“Fancy,” Clint notes, but starts getting the loaf and slicing. “You wanna talk about it, Cap?”

“Um, I don’t know,” he replies honestly, because he doesn’t. He alternates between periods of absolute rage when he doesn’t want to see another human being and periods of sadness when all he wants to do is be hugged to death by someone.

“Well, no pressure,” Clint says, speaking to the cutting board and not meeting his eyes. The silence in the room is comfortable, and they proceed working in this way for a while, Steve stirring the pasta and whisking milk into the cheese mixture.

It’s why civilizations around the world have rituals based on food, Steve thinks. It is not possible to be angry or upset while chopping vegetables with someone, side by side. Food carries significance and emotion and brotherhood, he knows. Maybe that’s why the Avengers do so well supporting each other through everything using food. Team dinners had been such a great idea.

“I just – “ He starts, lips moving without his conscious permission. “I just want him to be okay. I want him to be the same old Buck again, but I know that’s not fair. Seventy years has changed him, and I want to be accepting of that. It’s just – hard. I wish he could talk to me, you know?”

Clint nods, lips pursing in consideration before he speaks.

“Do you remember how Phil and I decided to take a break after he came back from the dead?”

“Hm-hmm,” Steve hums in response, unsure where this was going.

“Nat was shocked, she expected me to fall into his arms and never let go. It’s incredibly difficult to surprise that woman with anything, as you know,” Clint explains, his fingers working gracefully into the bowl of crumbs. “But we needed it. He experienced something foreign and scary and strange, and the Phil who came back to me wasn’t the same person that I had lost. I was clinging on to my memory of Phil for too long, and that wasn’t fair to him.”

“Are you saying I should take a break from my best friend? That I should – what, go away?”

“No,” Clint shrugs, turning bodily toward Steve now, his hip jutting against the counter. “All I am saying is that it’s okay for you to take some time in adjusting to this new person. Give him space and time, and forgive yourself for not understanding him immediately. Don’t beat yourself up for not _getting him_ like you used to, Cap. You have many, many gifts but mind reading isn’t one of them.”

Steve sighs.

“There’s just so much comfort in thinking that he is the same Buck, deep down, you know?”

“I do,” Clint answers, draining the pasta and prepping a baking tray for the oven. “And perhaps he is. You will discover shades of your old Bucky as you get to know him. Just don’t make that the only acceptable form of Bucky, okay?”

“Did Phil understand? When you asked for some time apart, did he understand?”

Clint is silent for a few minutes before he answers, and Steve wonders if he has gone too far. Clint and Coulson, are after all, very private and reserved about their relationship around the team.

“Not really,” Clint responds, with the air of someone who’s just worked out how to put some complicated ideas into sentences. He enunciates each word slowly. Steve remembers an old memory of Natasha telling him about the archer’s dyslexia. “Phil is obstinate and very good at blaming himself for things that aren’t his fault, including our break-up. But we got through it. You will too, Steve.”

Steve turns that over in his mind as they load the tray with the macaroni and pour the cheese over it. Clint draws a bow and arrow over the casserole with the bread crumbs, just because. They work largely in silence, and finally, they place the tray in the oven and start the timer.

“Jarvis, can you please notify me when it’s done?”

“Of course, Captain.”

“And me,” Clint smiles at the ceiling. They haven’t quite gotten used to not thinking of Jarvis as the house. “I was, after all, promised first taste.”

“Indeed, Agent Barton,” Jarvis replies, and there is a hint of amusement in his voice.

“Clint?”

“Yeah, Cap?”

“Thank you.”

*

**_Phil_ **

Phil cooking in the common kitchen is an unusual occurrence.

When Tony runs into him at five am on a Wednesday, it is because the engineer is in search of coffee and Agent is blocking his path to the most sacred appliance in the tower.

“Move G-man,” he grunts out, his fingers moving rapidly on a stark pad, barely looking up. He can usually make it to the coffee maker blindfolded, when there are not secret agents blocking his way. Tony has learned from experience that Coulson is the scariest of all of his teammates. Sure, Natasha can kill him in his sleep, but Coulson could do it with a bread loaf and a bobby pin. He has seen it happen.

Phil turns, grabs the handle of the pot and pushes a mug on the counter toward Tony. Tony pours himself his coffee single handedly, the other holding the tablet, eyes running over the numbers Jarvis is showing him.

He settles down on a stool and gulps down a mug and a half before looking up at the agent frying eggs in a pan in his kitchen before dawn.

“Do I want to know?” he asks, not sure if Coulson is in one of his moods today.

“I am guessing you are going to ask anyway,” Phil replies, trite and uncomfortable. He is plating the eggs on a pink princess plate, so Tony concludes that they are for Barton.

“You in the doghouse, Agent?”

The older man lets out a long sigh, and his shoulders are low and crouched. Tony realizes that this is the first time he has seen the man in something other than a suit. He is wearing a dark blue t-shirt and sweatpants. Tony can’t get over this sight, he didn’t imagine Coulson to be a person capable of owning sweatpants. He takes it as a sign of growth and maturity that he doesn’t mention it to the man's face.

“Clint is – " Phil grits out, as though it causes him a great deal of effort. “- less than pleased with me right now.”

“Breakfast in bed, huh? Didn’t figure you for the romantic type,” Tony grins, putting his tablet away and pouring himself a third cup of coffee. Meh, Cap isn’t here to cut him off, so he might as well make the most of this opportunity.

“I am not,” Coulson replies, starting the waffle maker. “But he is.”

“What did you do?”

“I might have – " Coulson is gritting his teeth again, fingers automatically reaching up to pinch the bridge of his nose. Honestly, Phil’s breathing techniques are a thing of beauty. The man has built up amazing resistance to put up with the Avengers on a daily basis. “- gone behind his back to check up on all of his ex-boyfriends and girlfriends.”

“Oooh, possessive much?”

“He felt the same way,” Phil sighs, and adds waffles to the plate now, pouring maple syrup into a small gravy boat with a handle. Tony didn’t know he owned gravy boats. Or maple syrup, for that matter. He blames Steve for going to the flea market and picking up kitchen utensils. It sounds like a very Stevish thing to do.

“He not putting out? Aw, is he making you sleep on the couch?”

“Don’t give me a reason to reach for my taser, Stark,” mutters Phil, but the threat is half-hearted at best. Tony has never seen him so down.

“Aw, Legolas will come around. We all know he is totally gone over for you. Really, the whole _having-sex-in-the-Quinjet-after-Moscow_ thing was a big giveaway, and beeteedub, so NOT cool. You may have traumatized Cap for life.”

“It’s not that simple.”

“What is complicated about staying the hell out of your lover’s past? Just maybe try not to go all CIA on Barton’s personal files again, okay? Ask Jarvis. He can do it discreetly for ya. He’s a true bro like that.”

Phil grunts, and pulls a small thin-necked flower vase. Seriously, where are all these things coming from? Who is stocking Tony’s kitchen with gravy boats and flower vases?

“Fried eggs and waffles?” he asks, incredulous, because Coulson is always on the team’s ass about eating within Shield’s healthy food guidelines.

“His favorite,” Coulson replies, using a napkin to wipe the outer edges of the plate. Tony has never seen anyone do that outside of Masterchef. “I know, I know, I don’t get how he made it to age thirty either.”

Tony reaches around the kitchen counter to start a fresh pot of coffee.

“Stark, no stop, I am cutting you off,” Phil grabs the pot from Tony’s hands (how’d he do that? Tony is so sick of living with these ninja spies all the time). “Have you slept at all?”

“Meh,” Tony mutters. “Sleep is for the weak.”

“Yeah no,” Phil says, and does something quick and efficient with his hands that the pot has vanished. Where did he put it? Tony’s brain is too sluggish to follow. Suddenly, Phil is placing a long-stemmed single red rose in the vase, and prepping a tray. “Go to bed, Stark.”

“Or what?” Tony asks because he is feeling brave, and frankly stupid, because he is standing in his own goddamn kitchen, hand clutching at the air for his coffee pot.

“Or,” Coulson turns around, tray in his hands, walking away from Tony. “I will tell on you to Cap.”

“Damn it.”

*

A week later, Tony finds Natasha in the kitchen, making breakfast wearing nothing but Bruce's dress shirt. He decides not to comment on it, realizes this is his life and runs toward the coffee maker. 

Coffee has yet to fail him in this madhouse, and he has a super soldier waiting for him in his bedroom. 

He wonders if Steve's dress shirt would fit _him_ , but again, that's a whole another story. 

**Author's Note:**

> Please leave a comment! I am trying to improve my writing, so comments are loved!


End file.
